Hi everyone- I'm relatively new to the craft and have accumulated a BUNCH of small items that I'm having trouble keeping organized so I can find them and not double purchase (already overpurchased rhinestone rivets-oops!)

I have a very large Plano tacklebox that has 5 slide out trays and 3 smaller trays, but I find that there are not enough compartments to store each size of rapid rivet, double cap rivets, conchos..... you get the idea.

I purchased some smallish tupperware containers for my buckles, and now I have two small towers of containers in addition to the tacklebox. All of this is stored in my supply room (basically piles of stuff and one large plastic shelving unit). I work in the kitchen at night and have to set up/break down every time I work.

Does anyone have a great system for storing all of these smaller items?

There are many methods, and all of them have compromises. I saw someone who kept jam/jelly/Mason jars and screwed the lids to a board, then stored each kind of bits in a different jar. But, if you have a wide variety, that will take a lot of space. Less space: a shoebox for each kind of hardware, then separate into labeled Ziploc bags.

Really Useful Boxes (tm) are really useful for this kind of thing... :) There are lots of different sizes of box with different sizes of trays and compartments etc.... worth looking at :)

Another idea is to use the sort of drawers that tend to be sold in Maplin/electronics stores for small components like resistors and capacitors etc. You can label the front of the drawers with what's in them, or stick one of the rivets or whatever.... on the front to show what's in there :D

And then I subdivide with small zip bags, so I can fit all say three or four sizes of brass rivet in one compartment, separated by the bags. Since I do leatherworking and jewelry making, I have a whole lot of smalls, and bag division within compartments is the most space effective way I have found where I can still easily find everything. I have those containers stacked sideways on my shelf like books, each labeled. It works well for me.

I use baby food pot trays. There's a tray that has 12 smaller pots that sit in slots. I have four of them and they stack nicely into one shelf of one of those desktop mail divider unit things you get in offices. I got mine from ASDA, the UK version of Wal-Mart (Wal-Mart own asda). You can get some really good units from craft shops too, with lots of shelves, but they can sometimes be expensive. Another good idea might be to look into diy ideas for herb and spice storage, there are tons of unique ideas and they'd be ideal for all the fiddly bits.